Susanna Wallumrod, best known for her Magical Orchestra, delivers a suite of stately 17th-century baroque songs by Purcell, interspersed with gothic ballads from Leonard Cohen and Nick Drake, with such purity of tone and spine-tingling conviction, it´s as if they were intended for one another. Arranged for a trio of early instruments by adventurous Swiss harpist Giovanna Pessi, the music is fresh yet timeless.Cormac Larkin, Irish Times

Lisa Smirnova´s "Eight Great Suites" in The Independent
This side of Handel is not often highlighted, but as a composer for keyboard he was without compare on this side of the Channel. These works emerge gloriously fresh in this Russian-Austrian pianist´s performance on her double CD: her ornamentation is unfussy, her touch warmly expressive.Michael Church, The Independent

Concert of Nik Bärtsch´s Ronin in The Wall Street Journal´s Best Concerts of 2011Nik Bärtsch’s Ronin, March 1, (Le) Poisson Rouge, New York:
I’ve loved the recordings by Bärtsch’s Ronin, a Zurich-based combo that places his piano at the center of precise, almost sterile jazz-funk that lingers obsessively on relentlessly repeated riffs that become hypnotic as the songs unwind. But I’ve never seen his group live. On this night, everything works: Drummer Kasper Rast and percussionist Andi Pupato toy with time and find all sorts of spaces to add unexpected accents. Bärtsch remains the calm at the music’s center, but the drummers try to knock him to the edge of chaos. He never falters.Jim Fusilli, The Wall Street Journal